Page 105 of Scoring Chance

I manage to get all of it in the sock. Even off the ice, I can still catch Tanner’s passes.

“Don’t put it back in the laundry,” Tanner says, heaving big breaths.

“Duh. I know.” I pump my hard cock into his ass, wanting badly to jackhammer him, but also wanting to be quiet. We’ll have lots more sex. It’s okay for some of them to be quick.

“Fuck. I need a sock of my own,” I huff out as the orgasm builds, making my whole body vibrate.

“No. Come inside me.”

Damn. Hottest thing Tanner has ever said.

I pull back until only my cockhead is in him, then plow back inside. He hisses with desire. I go dizzy as the need takes over me.

“Tan…” I empty myself inside his hole, filling him up like a gas tank. I stroke a lock of hair back from his face, admire how beautiful he is, his cheeks bright with color.

“A guy can get used to this regular stuff,” he says, pulling up his pants and catching his breath.

30

TANNER

Iwake up absolutely refreshed the next morning. I tiptoe out of bed so I don’t wake Des. The first thing I do is email my future employer to tell them things have changed and I won’t be accepting their offer. My family needs me. Old me would’ve felt bad about leaving them in the lurch, but after getting unceremoniously let go, I now know loyalty is non-existent in corporate America.

I tiptoe into the kitchen and toast two Pop Tarts. You never realize how hard things have been until you’re through them. It feels like I’ve been in crisis mode for the past two years, and finally, I can breathe.

I take the Pop Tarts upstairs and knock on Lena’s door. When she was little, she’d lay in bed for a good thirty minutes. She wouldn’t let us get her. She wanted to talk with her stuffed animals alone. I’d listen on the baby monitor, chuckling at her conversations, my heart full with gratitude that this little person was in my life.

Of course, parent life is always a dream when you have one kid. But as more kids got added to the mix, I had less time to enjoy those little moments.

She’s sprawled across her bed, a tangle of spaghetti-like arms and legs. Lena picks her head up, flutters her eyes open.

“Morning,” I say. I sit at the edge of her bed. “I brought you some breakfast. Do you remember how you and I would eat a Pop Tart together before you went to preschool?”

Lena rubs sleep from her eyes, her hair all asunder. “No. We did that?”

“Yeah. You were four. We’d toast them like champagne glasses and wish each other a good day.”

“I don’t remember that.”

It’s the blessing and curse of parenting: millions of little moments get lost to time. All the tantrums and yelling “no,” but also all of those tiny golden morsels in between. They all get washed away.

“We need to talk, Lena.”

“Is everything okay?” Her eyes bolt open. I can see that she, too, has been living in crisis mode.

I rub her hand, feel the bump of her knuckles. “When we lost your mom, I tried to step up. Everything your mom did, I could do. I told myself I could handle all the talks, all the lunches, remember all the school things. I didn’t want you all to feel her absence more than you would. But along the way, I started to rely on you. I needed help, but I didn’t want to admit it.”

“It’s okay, Dad.”

“No, it’s not.” I fight back tears that insistently spill down my face. “I wasn’t fair to you. Asking you to babysit your brothers and sister all the time. Making you become an adult way too soon. Yes, as the oldest, there is an expectation on you to help out more. That’s just the price of birth order. But I overstepped. You’re still a kid. I hate that you had to grow up fast, that I put that on you. We never talked enough about how you’re doing. You always put on such a good front. I never questioned it.”

There’s no parenting manual. No coach who can watch me play and give me instant feedback. I never know if I’m doing things the right way. I wish parenting could be an exam with actual right answers, and if I did something wrong, it would get circled in red ink and I’d know for next time.

Parenting is easy. Good parenting is hard.

I push tears off my cheeks. More come.

“It’s not your fault, Dad. You couldn’t help what happened. Did Des tell you…”